Our bodies waking up
by brittpezlo
Summary: A collection of kind of one - shot moments between Brittany and Santana told by Santana in the canon Glee universe, post 5x12.
1. If You Want Me, I'm Here

_This is my first fanfic! So please go easy on me. The Brittanna kiss in 5x12 '100' from the P.O.V. of Santana Lopez. Enjoy... _

Oh God.

My heart has just dropped through my body, out onto the floor. By this point she has it in her grips, but it feels different to before. It's not like she could destroy me at any moment by telling me that she doesn't love me. She has my heart and all its strings but this time it's as though she holds it safely. She knows the power that she has over me, how my knees buckle to her, succumb to her, how my brown eyes are completely lost within the crystal blue of her own. She knows she could destroy me, but she won't. Not this time.

It's as though time has slowed down, the seconds spread out across days now, like when I watch her dance and the sixteenth second of a step lasts for days, all I see is her form move, her passion, her anatomy in my dreams...

Shit. She's leaned over to me and I see her beautiful blue eyes flicker down to see my lips as though with the intent to devour me. I can't do this. Don't kiss me. Please don't kiss me. Please don't –

My insides had been empty ever since I sung those words to her over a year ago. I will always love you the most. And when I could no longer love her it was like everything inside me had suddenly been drained, like my heart was the vastness of space, nothing but blackness, emptiness, soulless, apart from the stars, the memories. The memories of her. They were all that kept me going.

She touches my face, with her thumb placed on my cheek and her fingers on her neck... this is the greatest indicator of how much I know she wants me now. I always felt somewhere inside like this relationship was one – sided, that she just accepted being more than friends to avoid breaking my heart... but now I know. Brittany is taking charge... she wants me.

Her lips are so soft, she tastes so good, and I can't stop myself from moaning my breath into her mouth... I'm so ready to surrender to her. All I want is for her to take me, for her to taste me forever, I want to get out of here, I just want to go with her.

Dani. My Dani. No. Don't lean into me again, as much as I want it... my teeth hit her lips and her hand moves from my face even though I can see as she licks her lips she can barely control herself.

"Okay... um. It's a bad idea."

No. Don't look at me like that, please don't look at me like that. If only you knew how much I want you you would not be looking at me like that. I secretly love how she won't lower her hand, everything about her now shows me how much she desires to kiss me again, but I can't look at her or else I will shamelessly surrender.

There's a pause.

She turns to face me again. She looks at me so fearlessly and all I can do it stop from my whole body shaking. I can hardly look at her. I feel like a child again, and she is so strong. She knows what she wants.

"It feels really good to be around you. You make me feel like.. a girl again. Like my body wakes up."

It's all I can do to stop from crying, because these are the scenes that kept playing out in my head in those nights in Louisville where I could do nothing but cry myself to sleep. I can only just control my voice enough to stop it from shaking.

"Please don't do this, okay. I have worked my ass off to get over you."

She gets up and what scares me the most is that I cannot help but to stare... at everything. I hate when she wears jeans. I hate her stupid butt. I hate her stupid blonde hair, and her pink lips, and her waist when all I wish I could do was grab it and pull her closer to me, and kiss her lips, and run my fingers through her hair, and take her jeans off...

Dani.

But I can't, and all I can do is sit here in my rigidity, not daring to move, I feel paralysed, and I hate that she's standing over me because I feel vulnerable but in the best way. I feel like I'm hers, like she can protect me, not as though she can hurt me. She's my protector now when all I ever tried to do was protect her. Her staring at me makes me feel more beautiful than I've ever felt, like I need not to dress up anymore, but that I can just be.

Oh God. I would say that she begins to speak, but it's more like she begins to drip honey off of her tounge.

"I really wanna be with you, Santana. I've seen the world and I'm sure now more than ever that I belong with you. And I'm sure your girlfriend's great, but... you can't recreate what you and I have."

There is no malice in what she says, no resentment for Dani. I wish that she were wrong but the words she says are only confirming the fears that I have had for months, that I chose a blonde girl to date, because, well...

Shit. Don't lean into me again. Please don't lean into me again. My brain has told my body not to move, because if I were to move I would touch her and all my adrenaline would mean that I would never stop touching her...

Her hands are on either side of my legs and she leans to kiss me on the cheek. I never knew that lips could conduct so much electricity as to ignite everything in my body that I had missing. She has woken up my body, but I'm too scared for my heart to wake up with it because I know what will happen.

She saw my eyes flicker to her lips and she knows she has me.

"If you want me, I'm here."

Of course I want you.


	2. I Always Wanted You

I decided to go home – to my parent's house – after the whole Brittany debacle.

I figured that might be a good idea, but when I got there I immediately realised the error of my ways. Every single thing in my house reminded me of her. Everything was tainted with the auora of Brittany. As far as I was concerned, the whole of Lima was Brittany. She'd walked on every pavement, and danced all through the halls of McKinley, and... I said a few months back to Mr Schue that Lima no longer felt like home. It had only reminded me of everything that I had lost. But now that Brittany was here again, it did feel like home. It was home. Home was whenever I was with her. It had been three hours and yet I was still drunk off of her breath. As I drove home I began to noticeably shake. She had shook me to the very core of my being and we didn't even need to make love for her to do that.. she only need to touch me. Oh, God.

I just... as much as I am a bitch, I'm not a cheater. Well, that's a lie – I used to cheat on Puck and Sam with Brittany all the time, but that was with boys who I never really thought mattered because I wasn't attracted to them. They were only there to save face. But I did not plan to intentionally cheat on my girlfriend, nor did I intend to get back with Brittany when I came back to Lima. At the same time I felt as though this was something I could barely control – falling in love with her again. Those words just continued to echo in my head; "you can't recreate what you and I had."

You can't recreate.

You can't recreate.

Brittany's words became stuck in my head, and what was worse was that her voice was the only thing that I could hear. I was so transfixed that I didn't even notice the hot tears pouring down my face, staining it in these red streaks along my cheeks. I know what it felt like to have my heart broken, and here I was about to break somebody else's heart. I was nothing but a fucking hypocrite. I had to call her.

As the phone rang out, I swear I could feel my heart inching it's way up out of my chest slowly, threatening to evacuate itself from my body – again – except this time taking a different exit.

"Hello?"

"H- hi D-Dani?"

"Santana?"

"Y- yeah"

"Babe? What's wrong?" her voice cracked noticeably at the other end of the phone.

"I – I did something – well I didn't do anything – she kissed me – and I pulled away – but not soon enough – and I'm not this type of person – but it happened – and I don't-" At this time I was sobbing into the phone. I wasn't sure she could even understand a single word that I was saying.

"No..."

"No! Please don't – I never meant to hurt you. I never meant for this to happen. I knew that when I c-came back there would be a shock to my system from seeing her again but I d-didn't... I wasn't going t-to –"

"Don't, Santana." She was crying, but not as hard as me. "I can't pretend that I didn't know that this was going to happen and you can't pretend either." Her voice began to raise a little more with every word she spoke. "How could I have been so stupid! The way you spoke about her... the way you called her your b-best friend – when I only ever wanted to be your best friend... but you're the one that never let me in! I was nothing but your New York fling and don't try to tell me anything different. I was never going to make you happy... you're officially off the hook."

There was a pause, from both of us. I finally mustered up the courage to say something.

"I never lied to you. I – I always liked you. I just –"

"You always loved her more. And you couldn't love me... as hard as you tried. I'm not going to force you back here when you don't want to be with me. "The way she was talking was like she _knew _this was going to happen. How did she know when I didn't even know? Or did I? Had I just forced it out of my subconscious?

"I am so sorry."

"Like I said, you're off the hook. I'll see you around, maybe, Santana."

"I- -" But it was too late. She had hung up.

This was the most conflicted I had probably been in my life. On one hand I had just lost a great girl when I wasn't even certain I could trust Brittany again... but the thing was that I loved her. Wasn't that enough?"

I got out my phone.

_Hi..._

No more than thirty seconds later. It was like she had read my mind.

_Finally. Hi, babe. _

_What are you doing?_

_I'm sitting in my car at McKinley, thinking about you, about us, about all the memories that we had here, and I'm waiting for you to tell me you love me back. I'm ready to come and see you when you tell me that you love me too, and I'm not getting out of the car until that happens, so._

_What if you run out of gas? Then you'll have to get out of your car._

_Then I'd just run to you. _

I was sure I'd gone bright red, but didn't stop to check. My stomach suddenly dropped. If was all well and good for Brittany to be romantic and cute, but this didn't prove that I should be with her. She was so high above me. She would find someone better – Sam, even.

_No, you wouldn't. _

_You wanna bet?_

_No. I don't want you to run all the way here just to prove some romanticised, grandeur gesture._

_Don't use big words, babe._

_Don't call me babe, then. _

_Ok, babe._

_Brittany. Stop. _

_Never. _

_I know it seems like it now, but you don't want to be with me. Not really. _

_I've always wanted to be with you. I've wanted to be with you since I was thirteen years old. I wanted to be with you when I was with Artie. And Sam. I love them... as friends, don't get me wrong. But they were never you. They only served to fill the massive gaping hole in my heart. Like when Lord Tubbington gets really hungry and his stomach starts to growl, but he's on a diet, so he settles instead for his healthy food instead of his real cat food. You're my legit cat food, Santana._

_Should I be flattered? That you just compared me to cat food? Even though that was really sweet._

_I don't know, yes. I don't care, because I know you understood what I meant, because you didn't call me stupid or anything. But I always wanted you. I wanted you that time we both got into the Cheerios in freshman year, and we hugged because we were so happy, and then we pulled away from the hug and kind of stared at each other like we shouldn't have hugged for that long. I wanted you when you started to cry when you were drunk at school in alcohol awareness week. I wanted you when we first made love and you screamed my name really super loud but then tried to mask it like you were laughing because I had just ticked you, because you were scared your parents might be home, even though they weren't, and then we did it again in the bathroom. I wanted you everytime you drunk text me before you came out telling me you loved me and wanted me in your pants, and then again in the morning when you made an excuse that someone stole your phone or something. I wanted you when you were in New York and I used to dream about you all the time, and I kept your t – shirt that said Lebanese and I refused to wash it even though it was kind of rank. I've loved you forever, in my past life, even, and I will love you until the end of time. _

I read over it four times before I replied, because I was crying so hard.

_I love you, too. I want you, too. Come over. But don't run, it won't be fast enough. _


	3. Never anyone else

"What are you thinking about?" The words startled me out of a fairly stoic existence. She must have felt me jolt alert as I looked down to my left to see a gentle face looking back up at me. I'm not sure if I had simply been neglecting to notice it amongst the whirlwind reunion which saw Brittany's back pushed up against my bedroom door, with hands everywhere and tongues messily searching, but there was now a kind of timidity in her face, as though the question she had just asked me she had dared to do.

All I really knew is that I never wanted her to feel as though she was daring to do anything around me, because for so long I had made her feel as though she had to. She had been daring in trying to kiss me, and daring in texting me what she had, and I owed her to be completely honest about what I felt.

"You. Just you." The reply came with a kiss on her very perfect nose, cold against my lips. "I'm thinking about how I wasted so much time being without you..." My mouth carried itself across Brittany's cheek, butterfly kisses spread down her chin and then back upon the other cheek. Beneath my face I felt hers shutter and was suddenly brought back to the choir room when this role was reversed. I never believed myself to have that same effect on Brittany as she did me, at least, I had forgotten what it felt like, to have the power to make someone shiver and moan beneath you, if only from words and kisses. I just never wanted to abuse that power how I had before, when we were young and dumb, and I wanted her mine and no one else's, without ever giving the title of being so.

Shakily, she spoke again whilst I was lost in my own thoughts and her skin simultaneously. "I – don't think it was all wasted."

She would have witnessed my brows furrowing closely together. "What do you mean, baby?" It came out like a whisper, the last word even less so. It happened without my really thinking about it, just kind of falling away, but by the second syllable I had only slightly retracted, worrying if it were too soon for that term of endearment.

But apparently not, because soon enough her cheeks were bunching up and her mouth forming into a perfect grin. "I missed hearing that."

"I missed saying it..." I was still whispering, and internally cursed myself for not being able to exceed that faint volume.

The grin faded into a smile, and soon enough the confidence which had been displayed in the choir room was back. "I suppose I just mean... that as much as I spent this whole year wishing, either consciously or otherwise that I was with you, I wouldn't have known what I really wanted if we hadn't have been apart, and if there hadn't been someone else trying to hold my hand I wouldn't have realised that you're the only one I ever want to hold it. But you know, Santana, I won't hold it against you if you enjoyed someone else holding _yours_. Because with Sam it wasn't exactly anything profound, but that doesn't mean your – relationship – didn't mean anything either."

'Britt – Britt – "

"No just hang on." She shifted upright and smiled at me softly. "You don't have to explain it to me just yet. I'm just glad that you ended it with her, because I'm really serious about this, Santana, and I won't accept having just a small part of you. I know I kissed you first but I wouldn't cheat anymore than we have in the past. But I also want you to know that I'll go as slow as you want because I don't expect you to be able to adjust so quickly to dating one person and then dating another straight after – well, I mean, if you, if you want to – date –"

Cheeks which had grown crimson were interrupted from producing such sweetly spoken words as I cut her off by kissing her again. She tasted the same, and my lips bunched into a smile at the memory, which was no longer merely a memory. She either had the same thought or felt my smiling, because all of a sudden I felt her smiling as her mouth was pressed up against mine.

I needed to break up the smiling kiss, though. "I appreciate that, Britty. I really do, because you're the sweetest person I know for saying that – and for a lot more reasons, actually. Being with Dani was something I needed to do, I guess, because I was sad a lot of the time when I had just moved to New York and she changed that – and by that I mostly mean that dating got me out of the house – but whatever fun I had with her – I never told her I loved her, Britt. I never did. Maybe I'll miss hanging out with her now, but I'll never miss her like I missed you. Because there never was anyone else. Not really. Not at all, actually."

It almost scared me how boldly she looked at me then. Someone staring at you like you were everything. Where I would have looked away before, I no longer wanted to anymore. If it were a year ago, in Louisville, I would have looked away because it scared me that she could feel so compelled as to want to stare. It's not that I didn't want to stare back, it's that I was scared that one day I would have to look away. Now, though, I didn't ever want to look anywhere else.

"I love you." The words I was never tired of hearing from light pink lips.

I was launching forward before I knew it, putting my mouth on hers, without a need to invite my tongue inside her mouth as she was already a step ahead of me – like always – tilting her head upwards inviting me in. It was warm, and I was sure it had never felt so warm before.

Retracting slightly, Brittany groaned into my mouth at the loss of contact, and then moaned when she heard why I had pulled away. "I love you. I love you. I love yo –"

I would have continued on, but a sleek hand grabbed my face, bringing it into her own, while the tips of the fingers of another ran up my side, hypnotising me asleep, lain in the arms of Brittany S. Pierce again.


	4. I want to marry you

**A/N: SO, it's been so so long but I had a little burst of inspiration with the premiere being tonight so I decided to write some fluff. This is my headcanon for Brittana on the mall tour and how the topic of marriage came up between them. Brittana is endgame everyone! I, for one, couldn't be happier. **

The mall tour took off so quickly, that if it weren't for Britt being with me, I'm not sure I would have had it in me to process everything that was going on. There were days when I was singing in front of thousands of people alongside Mercedes and I could hardly remember how I got there. One day, we were conjuring up a hit song together, thinking about how cool it would be if anyone outside of the studio walls (besides Britt) ever heard it - and the next the dream was becoming a reality. More people were hearing – and loving – the song than we possibly could have foreseen. Nothing worth having ever came easy, though. It was a whirlwind, but it had taken a lot of work to get there, and there was, so, so much more to go. The performing part was incredible. Like a rush I'd only ever really felt at Nationals three years earlier, but a million times more intense. That was the great part of this experience. But what was better was the time directly after I sang, where I would wave everyone backstage off, chuck on a hoodie at some attempt at concealing myself, and sprint two stairs at a time at whatever mall we were at to the balcony and watch my beautiful, flawlessly talented, sexy girlfriend dance for the song right after mine. I loved Mercedes' voice, but its sound started to fade out in my ears when I saw Brittany dance. She would be a floor beneath me but I could still feel every move as she made it, like I was with her, close enough to breathe her in. She knew I watched her every performance, and she let me know that she knew, too, by rolling her hips in just the right way, teasing me and letting me know what I'd been missing on the crowded tour bus where interruptions were frequent. Not that we didn't find ways. There were ways, but in every new city we tried to have a date night, and our new income meant we could afford to throw some money at hotel rooms here and there. Some nights were her dates and some were mine, but whether she took care of me or me of her, we were together on those nights, and that's all that really mattered.

We fought a little, but I fought with Mercedes, too, about the same kinds of things. That was the reality of living on a bus. I always left my clothes all over the place, still not seeing the need to fold clothes and put them away after twenty years of life, and Britt still felt the need to watch every YouTube video on Ellen's channel – without headphones in – at 8:30am in the morning – but any time we got too frustrated with each other, we had "us" time. Every night after a show we would lie in our single bed (there was a spare third bed no one was using because we wanted to share, of course), forehead to forehead, eyes focused on each other, talking about everything there was to talk about. She whispered to me about how even though it drove her crazy sometimes, she loved how my hair smelled even when I took a too – long shower, and I told her about how even though I didn't understand her being an early riser, I loved being woken up by butterfly kisses all over my face at ungodly hours (10am). She told me about how proud she was of me a lot, and I told her how lucky I was that of all people in the world, she chose me to love her. To that she responded that she hadn't chosen me, and that it had always just been me. I didn't know if she would ever stop causing my face to go hot so often. I hoped not.

By the time we reached San Francisco, I'd decided my girlfriend deserved a night away from being in such close quarters with everyone and everything and that I was going to take her out on date night. Britt did romantic things for me all the time. She would bring calla lilies into my dressing room and wish me good luck on; get me breadsticks from whatever city we were in when I was being grumpy, and left notes for me in the bathroom with "For Santana (not Cedes) Love, Britt Britt" every morning. But I mean, I was with the most intelligent, talented, loveliest kindest person in the entire world. I wanted her to know that I appreciated her, and was, obviously, very deeply and irrevocably in love with her, too.

We ended up shamelessly flirting with each other on the way to the restaurant. When we get there, I moved to hold the door open for Brittany and feel her pinch my butt, whisper "thanks" in ear in that low gravelly tone she only reserves for when she's really trying to tease me, and walks past, swaying her hips just so that she knows I'll notice. She turns back and sees me grinning.

"Stop!" I whine to her. I feel my cheeks, and they're so bunched up it feels like they'll stay that way forever.

Brittany moves to stand side by side with me and puts her left hand on my waist. It's a small gesture but my heart still flutters when her hands acknowledge that I'm hers in public. Every damn time. "You won't be saying that later..." gets muttered under her breath.

I shoot Brittany a look, smiling with my tongue between my teeth, as if to say "you're evil, but I love it". Before I can reply properly, the hostess seats us at our table.

When we're seated, I make a point to grab Brittany's hand right away a top the table as we go through the menu. She blushes – noticeably – and where I would have probably looked down into my lap, she looks right at me and says "I still love it when you do that."

I'm grinning at her now. Ever since we started this thing back up again – though, I'm not sure if it was ever truly not happening – I've been probably a little too forthcoming in gestures like this. It's just that I've seen so much more of the world now, with living in New York and the mall tour, and I'm not afraid of holding my girlfriend's hand anymore. I want to hold it. All the time. So I'm going to.

Just as the young waiter is ready to take our order, we're interrupted my loud cheers from the other side of the restaurant. A tall, fair haired, very handsome man is exclaiming to everyone – "He said yes! He said yes!" The man then started kissing another man – his new fiancé, I suppose – in front of everyone at the restaurant. A year earlier, I probably would have made some snarky comment about how cliché it all was – a proposal in a restaurant, probably with the ring in the champagne glass or something equally as cheesy – but I didn't. I just sat there, and squeezed Britt's hand harder as we watched these two people promise to begin the rest of their lives together. I didn't know what the journey was, but if they had faced some of the difficulty that I had, I hoped all the best for them. Turning back from the couple, I saw Brittany staring at me, wide eyed and grinning.

"You're crying, San." No way. Surely I wasn't.

I put my hand to my face and it felt wet all of a sudden. I had shed a tear or two.

"Oh. Woops." I smiled at her. If it was anyone else, Kurt or Cedes or Rachel, I would have been so embarrassed. But it was Brittany, so I just smiled, and she smiled back.

We ordered our food, and sat there in a contented silence for a while before it arrived, breathing each other in. I stilled loved to just look at her. I had wasted so much time in high school, pretending that I wasn't blatantly staring at her, making up so many excuses about boys and dates and friends with benefits. Now I was able to just take it all in without pretending. It was better than anything I could've asked for.

Our meals arrived, and then the comfortable silence was broken a few minutes later.

"What do you think about all of that, anyway?" Brittany asked.

"All of what, baby?" I thought I knew what Britt was talking about, but I felt like if I pre – empted her answer, I might be wrong. Just in case.

"Marriage. Engagement. The whole thing. Since we legally can now in so many states. Well not, Lima, but... like, do you want to get married... someday?" I was right. I knew that's what Britt wanted to ask, because I'd wanted to ask the same thing. I knew – and I mean, I had known for a while – that Brittany was it for me, and that she'd always be it for me. To me, it was kind of just a matter of now or later. I must have gotten lost in thinking all of this though, because she took my silence differently than I'd meant it

".. Or not." Britt frowned down at her plate.

"NO! No no." Her eyes went wide now. Dammit, Santana.

"No, that not what I meant, I mean. I was just thinking about how I'd wanted to ask you the same thing. And yeah, I do. "

She looked at me then, and I only just realised I hadn't said _what _I'd wanted to do. After seeing Brittany's face so sad when she thought my silence meant no, I knew I had to forget all my embarrassment over clichés and corny and just say what I needed to say. What I needed her to hear. What she deserved after so many years of me skirting around everything.

"Yeah, I want to get married. I want to marry _you._ I know I want to marry _you._ And be engaged. All of it. I've probably always known, Britt. I know we've kind of joked about being an old married couple before, but I wasn't sure what you really thought about the whole thing."

I knew my voice had wavered towards the end and I hoped she didn't notice, but knowing her, she would have. She noticed everything about me. I think I knew Brittany wanted to get married, but I wasn't sure where an actual, real life engagement was on her radar right now. I found out, though. Her eyebrows raised in surprise. It wasn't surprise at my first revelation, though. It was surprise at the question.

She took both of my hands in hers and squeezed them, hard.

"Santana..." Brittany breathed. "I love you, but sometimes you miss things because you're so unbelieving that you deserve them. But you do. If anything, I don't deserve someone who loves as fiercely as you do, that sometimes they forget that someone loves them back just as much."

I still didn't know how she managed to know everything about me when I didn't even know it, but my body felt like it was on fire. She was looking at me so boldly, and with so much love, that I didn't think I'd ever look away, and I was pretty sure that now, I wouldn't ever have to.

"I love you, too." My voice cracked a little. "So... you _do_ want to get married?"

She sighed. A really contented sigh. "Yes. To you."

My cheeks were bunching up again. "Okay. Okay. Okay good. I love you so much right now."

"I love you so much all the time."

"Yeah, me too."

We stole fleeting glances for the rest of the night and talked about the tour, each other, the glee kids and what it would be like when we got back to New York. The subject didn't come up again. It didn't have to. It would only be half true to say that Brittany and I always knew what the other was thinking. Britt knew. I think I did, too, but sometimes I was timid about asking what I really wanted to know, because she was right. I didn't believe that I deserved all of this. I think that's fair, though. I didn't deserve her. She was a genius, and that was so much more than just a fleeting conversation we'd had during the senior year student presidential campaign. She really was a genius. She knew me, and she knew about the world, about feelings, and what they meant, the same feelings that I sometimes felt so overwhelmed having to fathom, but she loved me all the more for it. There was one thing I was so, so certain of, though. Brittany and I vibrated on a frequency, or something like that, that was beyond anything else that I had ever felt with another person. So when she had said that yes, she wanted to marry me, and I her, we both knew, silently, that that had meant soon, and that she was waiting for me to ask. She wasn't impatiently waiting, but she knew, and I knew, that it was going to happen. Whereas marrying Brittany was something that I had always know inside my head, I had now reconciled with the fact – and I was so, so happy it was a fact, now - that this was going to become a reality soon. I was going to give Brittany everything she'd waited nearly half her lifetime for. I was going to marry Brittany S Pierce, and I couldn't wait to ask.


	5. You Oughta Know

**A/N: Hey guys! So, after the amazingness that was last Friday, it had me thinking about why Brittany brings up 'You Oughta Know' to Santana. In my headcanon, it's Britt remembering that Santana once said it was her favourite song, and kind of sussing out to see if it still is. Santana doesn't seem to really react to it, which makes me think that it's not, which makes me think our girl has grown up a whole lot. Anyway, hope you enjoy! **

My girlfriend's genius mathematical mind had worked out the perfect tempo of which to set our mash up to. We'd been practising together all night in her bedroom, even though Britt just had to stop and laugh every time I'd sing the line about being short but healthy, because "it's just that you're so short and it's so cute", apparently. Britt wanted to speed the songs up, she said, since no one in that room was ever able to keep up with us anyway, and an increase in tempo meant we'd just throw them off even more.

"I don't think you realise how much you make me laugh." I say, and here she goes, giving me that look again. Where her whole face softens, even the little furrow of her eyebrows, and she's looking at me like I'm the sun and the moon or something. "No, I mean really Britt; I'd say Cedes is the only one besides you out of those losers who's actually funny. But even then, no one holds a candle to you." I'd lost my nerve a little and whispered that last part.

"You're kidding, right? Sometimes, when Rachel's doing one of her rip off Mr Schue pep talks, I think about the impression you do of the faces Blaine makes when he's singing" – she threw her head back and clasped her hands together, giggling at the thought of my impression – "AMAZING. Just amazing." She said through her laughter, drawing closer and closer to me from the other side of the bed, enclosing her hands, my favourite pair of hands in the whole world, over my arms, moving them feather light up and down. Her pale blue eyes met mine, and everything went quiet for a moment, even though she'd been laughing so heartily not thirty seconds ago. That had been happening with us a lot, lately. One second we'd be laughing for longer that I think we'd ever have before, and the next she'd be looking at me, and I at her, like we couldn't quite believe that we were here and this was happening. And in this room, of all rooms in the world. So much had happened here. I'd read something once about how every time you have a birthday, you should remember that you're not just that age you're turning. You're your five year old and eleven year old and fifteen year old and nineteen year old self, all at the same time. That's kind of how it felt in this room, in the best way. I knew that while on one level I was twenty one and about to propose to my girlfriend the next day, but I was also fifteen and silently in love with my best friend, and seventeen and dancing to Whitney Houston songs with the love of my life. I was all these things at once, here, but it didn't hurt anymore. The words left unsaid, and the feeling like I didn't deserve any part of her and she'd come to realise it soon enough, all of that... it still meant something to me because I wouldn't be here without it. But it didn't hurt anymore. Even when I was sixteen and so, so angry. Not even that hurt anymore. I remembered what I used to listen to when I was mad.

"You know, I wonder if anybody will sing 'You Oughta Know' for this assignment. Sixteen year old me would have probably critiqued any cover of it to no end, but I'm pretty sure Tina could do Alanis a little justice. Maybe even Berry. Ha. Don't tell her I said that." I said, even though Rachel could probably use having her ego fed a little nowadays.

Her face changed. So quickly and so subtly I had hardly even noticed it. Suddenly I felt like she was looking right through me even more than she always was. There was something else there, though. Her bottom lip jutted just a little and her eyes had lost something. It was sadness, but not just the average kind of sadness. Brittany sadness. The worst kind.

"Hey, hey hey" I said, kissing her pout away. "What's wrong? It's cos I mentioned Berry, isn't it? She always kills the mo –"

"No, no" she interrupted. "It's not Rachel. It's... st – silly." Brittany said, with the tiniest hitch in her voice.

The beginning of 'st' made my heart drop a little. "Hey, you know, nothing you've ever said has ever been silly. I don't think you'd start now." I said with a calm smile, urging her to tell me what was on her mind.

Brittany looked at me with a calmness in her face, the way she always did before she was about to tell me the truth. I've never stopped being in awe of her ability not to hold back on how she feels.

"I just – I want you to know, first off that I don't feel insecure about us. I can't remember the last time I did, because I don't have to dig so deep to get to you anymore. You show me all of you now, without me even having to ask. It just makes me sad when I think about how you used to be sad. And how I used to make you sad. Because I just love you so much, so, so much, Santana, and I wish I had always just made you nothing but happy." Brittany sighed, looking up at me with a shrug, a smile and glassy eyes.

"Baby, I love you too, but I don't know what you're talking about. I told you, you make me so happy. Not sad." I replied, and my palms got a little sweaty, nervous because I was trying to work out what'd she'd meant. For all of high school, I'm pretty sure everyone thought that I was smarter than Brittany, that I was guiding her along through everything, and maybe sometimes I was. What they didn't realise, though, is that she did the same for me. She always straightened out my thinking for me before I even knew what any of it meant.

I was so glad she hadn't gone anywhere, though. She still stayed with her hands over my arms, anchored to me, like always.

"Do you remember junior year, when Mr Schue was trying to get us all to write songs, but all anyone could come up with was stuff about giant hearts, and eating wheaties to avoid diabetes?" I nodded. She left out the entire trouty mouth fiasco. I should have known she would have to spare me the embarrassment.

Brittany took a deep breath. "Anyway, he wanted us be inspired, so he asked everyone what their favourite songs of all time were, and you said – well..."

Oh.

_I'm here to remind you of the mess you left when you went away. It's not fair to deny me of the cross I bare that that you gave to me. _

"... and it was that week after you told me you loved me, but I told you that I was with Artie, so we couldn't..."

_It was a slap in the face how quickly I was replaced. _

"... and I knew you'd loved that album, but I didn't know that was your favourite song. You'd never told me that. So I kind of thought... that it was your new favourite song... because of me."

I put my face in my hands. Truthfully, I was embarrassed at that whole memory. I mean, when I was sixteen, my bedroom walls were _black. _The leather jacket obsession was at its peak. I thought I was the damn living embodiment of Alanis circa 1995.

I looked up, and Brittany was looking at me, very curious to see why essentially face palming myself was the extent of my reaction. That song meant very different things to both of us, but she needed to know what it had meant to me, but I knew that would take a lot of words to say, and I didn't want to leave her hanging, standing there for five minutes thinking she was the only source of all that angst and pain when she wasn't. So I cupped her face in my hands and I kissed her. Softly. She gasped a little against me in surprise, and I pulled back, threw my arms around her neck and held her tight. Her hands found my waist and she pulled me into her just as strong. Neither of us said anything for a moment.

I pulled back to look at her in the eyes and sighed. "Britt Britt, that was my favourite song because it was the angriest song I knew, and I was the angriest person I knew at the time. It was like, a perfect fit. Ha. But I was angry at myself for not knowing how to handle what I was feeling. I was angry at my bad timing. I was mad at you, too, and I was mad at Artie, but nowhere near how mad I was at myself. It was that line... that line..." - I looked up off to the side, trying to remember it – "cos the love that you gave that we made wasn't able to make it enough for you to be open wide. That one. I used to think that about myself. "I said, kind of relieved I had gotten through that many words. Sometimes I thought we were rubbing off on each other when it came to the whole, getting good at giving speeches thing. I hoped I'd be that good for tomorrows. That might well be the biggest one of all.

The look she had waiting for me in return gave me chills, because I'm certain if I'd told the old version of myself that one day Brittany would be my soon to be hopefully fiancé and she'd be looking at me like that, I would have done anything. Maybe even told her I loved you sooner, and quit the whole mad at the world shtick.

Her voice was small again, how it was when she told me she loved me sometimes. "What do you mean?"

I knew she meant the lyrics I'd just quoted without even having to ask. "I mean... you gave me everything there was to give. You loved me and didn't think twice about it, and I loved you back, but it felt like no matter what there was this – hate, or something – inside me that I didn't know how to get over. I was scared I wouldn't be enough for you because of it. And when I was willing to try to get over it, it was too little too late. The timing was wrong and I'd hurt you too much already by telling you what we had wasn't what you thought it was, even though it totally was. That's what I was mad at. Missing my chance, and not being good enough for someone that was so, so much more than enough for me." You looked like you were about to cry. "But now I know that I'm enough. Well, I don't think I'll ever compare to how much enough you are for me, but I know I'm enough now. I've grown up, and I know that, Brittany. So don't worry about that."

It was a lot more than I'd ever said at once to someone that wasn't a hurl of insults, but I knew if I expected for this woman to say yes to marry me, then I had to lay everything down. No reservations.

"You've always been more than enough for me." She said. That part felt like an electric current flowing through my body.

I could do nothing else but smile.

"Can I ask you something else, though?" She asked.

"Yes." I replied, without missing a beat.

"What did you think about me when you were mad at me?" Brittany said.

I liked that our relationship was this honest, that it didn't really feel like we were dredging up the past, but more seeing how the past had gotten us to where we were now.

I took a deep breath. "I thought that you had left behind a mess, and I was mad because I didn't know what do to with myself. I thought for a little while that you didn't care about me, but I realise how untrue that was soon after. I realised you were too moral to just drop Artie for me right away. And maybe that you needed to protect your heart from me for a little bit. But my opinion of you, I mean, what I really innately thought about you, that never... that never changed. I was just angry, and I didn't think anything was fair. I was a dumb kid."

Brittany's eyebrows furrowed when she heard the last part.

"Santana, you weren't ever a dumb kid. Not ever. You know who was dumb kid? JBI. Not you." She said it with so much conviction, without pause, it almost felt something she had rehearsed it, even though I knew she hadn't.

"Brittany, my walls were black, and I told everyone I had razor blades in my hair. Amongst other... really shitty things." I said, remembering calling people trouty mouth, and the Finn fat jokes, and... geez. There were a lot.

"Yeah, I know. I had to sleep over in your room and would look around feeling like I was in the middle of space. I remember the black walls, don't worry." We both laughed. "I'm not going to excuse everything you've ever done, S, and you know that. I don't have to tell you that. But you... here's the thing."

A Brittany deep breath took place, which meant warm breath being blown on my face. It kind of felt like heaven.

"If you had to push down everything to feel like you had to survive, and the person that was left was someone who threatened people with razor blades in their hair, then I'm proud of her. I'm proud that she got through it, that she grew up to be you. You don't seem to realise that if I wanted to be with someone who wears pink and puts stars everywhere, I'd go see what Rachel was up to. But I _don't. _I want to be with the girl whose favourite colour is black, because she's _you. _I love you because you feed Lord Tubbington every morning, but I love you because it takes you forty – five minutes and two coffees to open your eyes after you've officially woken up. I love everything about you, and it's not about it being the good or the bad or the ugly. It's about it being the Santana. That's the point. So don't ever call yourself dumb. My girlfriend is anything but."

And she said that in the calmest form of a speech I've ever heard, and I grinned at her, and it only validated to me what I'd known since she told me this was for infinity. Tomorrow would be the day.

"Hey, Britt Britt?" I said, a tear threatening to cascade down my cheek.

"Yeah, babe?" Brittany replied.

"You want to know what my favourite song of all time is today?"

_Oh, baby, when I see your face, mellow as the month of May. Oh darling, I can't stand it, when you look at me that way..._


End file.
